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2014 IFMAR Worlds News

Clear skies finally appeared on the last day of the 2014 Worlds – revealing the mighty Mount Etna Volcano

The next IFMAR World Championships may be upon us, but in this feature we take a look back at some of the pivotal and memorable moments from the most recent Worlds; in September of 2014 in Messina on the island of Sicily.

5150 Media Productions, together with Pro-Line Racing, is proud to present the 2014 IFMAR Nitro Buggy World Championships!

Held in the beautiful Mediterranean city of Giardini-Naxos Italy, these worlds did not disappoint. The track was challenging, the weather was ever changing & the competition was fierce. Take a behind the scenes look at what really goes on at a Nitro World Championship. Narrated by Mike Garrison (Neobuggy.net & RCNews.net), this “Come Drive With Us” Movie focuses on Lee Martin, Mike Truhe & once again, Ty Tessmann.

5150 says, “Special Thanks go out to Lee Martin, Mike Truhe, the Tessmann family and Mike Garrison. Last, but not least, we would like to thank Pro-Line for sponsoring this episode. Without their support we couldn’t bring you this story!”

AKA sits down with their team driver, Carson Wernimont, and pick his brain to get an in depth look at his tire selections during the 2014 IFMAR 1/8 Nitro Offroad World Championships, where he finished 3rd on the podium! Sit back and soak up the ‘Wernimont’s Wisdom’.

It’s no secret that racers will do whatever it takes to win, or at least whatever THEY think it takes to win. Often times this means running a product they feel is superior at that given time to what their sponsoring companies offer. Primarily this is seen when drivers are struggling with tires, engines, or perhaps fuel. Secretly they run a product manufactured by their sponsors competition in order to gain the edge they are looking for.

This scenario just so happened at the 2014 IFMAR World Championships in Italy, when AKA’s Martin Bayer took the track in the Final running Pro-Line tires. AKA has taken a stand today making a public announcement, releasing Bayer from the AKA race team for his decision.

“AKA is regretfully announcing the release of Martin Bayer from the AKA race team. This action was dictated by the decision of Martin and his chassis sponsor to run a tire other than AKA in the world championship final. We wish Martin all the best in 2015.”

This is not the first time we have seen a contract terminated due to similar situations, but it is the first in recent years on such a large scale. Will this change the minds of top racers choosing to run the competitors products in the future?

SWORKz is happy to announce the signing of top American driver Austin Blair to our expanding list of pro drivers. Austin brings a very impressive resume to our U.S based team including 5 ROAR Nationals podiums as well as his well known driving style. Austin will join U.S team manager Marty Korn at major U.S off-road events through 2016.

“I have been testing the S350 EVO, S350-BE, and S104 for many months now. The SWORKz cars allow me to drive aggressively without the worry of failures and they respond very predictably to setup changes.”

The news shouldn’t come as a huge surprise given Amain.com’s influence as the company behind SWORKz distribution in N.America, the move a logical one with Austin’s status as Amain.com’s #1 competitive ‘in house’ driver (judging on the recent ROAR 1/8 Offroad results) and their desire to promote & sell the brand in the N.American market.

“I felt comfortable with the the SWORKz cars very quickly and I am very pleased to have been given the opportunity to join such a passionate and devoted company.”

Team Associated, its been a rocky year for the 27x World Champions – at least in 1/8 Offroad, designer departures, scrapping the former prototype, Maifield leaving, however they showed a real team ethic at the 2014 Worlds last week after turning up with a VERY early prototype buggy which they asked us not to photograph in detail (no under the hoods etc).

However withRyan Cavalieritaking 2nd overall with this mysterious buggy saw our inbox overflow with requests for photos, we had a few of course – the car wasn’t exactly hidden, and given the length of the event (I think we missed a birthday or two ?!) we had to do something… so feast your collective eyes on a few spy photos of the car that theCavalieri, Neil Cragg, Yannick Aigointrio ran at the Worlds.

In an interview with Yannick Aigoin at the Worlds he said the car was “really easy to drive” – and he was optimistic of achieving a better team result than in Argentina.

Please note both team manager Brent Thielke and new 1/8th designer Kody Numedahl stressed this was basically a car they put together for this event, with the finished version being quite different, however it seems to have worked pretty well with AE’s best result so far with 2nd for Cav and Neil Cragg barely missing out on the final.

We’ve watched like a hawk the official results page for a few days now, eager to see if the overall results would be posted from the Worlds in Messina, however we’ve managed to get hold of them first! Here they are:

After staging the 15th IFMAR 1/8 Offroad World Championships, the oganising team from Messina have sent out a press release that we’re happy to repost:

The Messina Worlds Association would like to thank the Major and the City Hall of Giardini Naxos, IFMAR, EFRA ed AMSCI, all the companies that have sponsored the event and partners, the whole staff, external collaborators, all the R/C model car lovers from all over Italy that suppported the event, the Interforce group della Jonica (security and fire dept), the Conferenza Regionale Sicilia delle Misericordie d’Italia e di Messina (medical staff), all the websites, press and journalists that followed and broadcasted the IFMAR 1/8 Off road World Championship and, above all, the drivers that raced at this spectacular event.

Besides, we hope to have in the future other opportunities to meet again in order to organize other events giving further exposure to the R/C model car world.